[themaclad]

https://www.fotmob.com/matches/preston-v...tab=lineup

Referee: Andrew Kitchen

Attendance: 14,009 (576 Oxford fans)

The one thing about playing Friday night is, you can get the misery out of the way before Saturday comes, on last night's performance even the hapless aps at White Hart Lane would be able to beat us.
Oxford could have been out of site by half time, the result didn't flatter the one little bit, another hapless display from a team tootally lacking in confidence and literally no idea what to do when the ball is crossed into rhe box.
One down early on, free kick into box, Helik in front of Gibson(had a shocker) bundled ball home, could have been two minutes later, second phase chipped into six yard area, Brown headed over.
Level on 12 minutes, may have been a hand ball by Dobbin early in the move, great ball into box Osmajic heads home.
Fairly even for a time, but Donley shot wide and then Mills made a 80 yard run before firing wide.
A chaotic 60 second period, pin ball in their area, they break away almost score when Cornell denies Lankshear.
Finally start to get the upper hand until the mysterious goalkeeper injury occured.
Half time level but not for long, we balls up a free kick and within 60 seconds shot from outside the box deflected in by Lankshear.
They soon get a third Brown outmuscles Gibson to flick past Cornell, the feeling of doom over the ground, people left as the fire drill kicked in early, a Devine run and shot offered a slight bit of resistance but the game had long gone as had many of our fans.
Shambles

HECK

Paul Heckingbottom was disappointed to see his side lose 3-1 against Oxford United at Deepdale.

The away side led early on through Michal Helik, but Milutin Osmajić’s header brought North End level soon after.

Two more goals in the second 45 secured all three points for the away side, with PNE’s boss not pleased with the manner in which the Lilywhites conceded their goals.

“Really disappointing,” stated Hecky. “It's always about the result, but the manner of the goals we conceded made the game really, really difficult for us.

“We know what they've been doing, and we've been really weak in key moments and given poor goals away, which has made the game really difficult for us.

“You've just got to be stronger. We didn't defend our box well at all. We gave a really sloppy goal away to start with. But we did really well to come back in because it was us with the ball.

“But then, second, third phase, not dealing with the balls in our box. Forwards getting the wrong side of us. So, we just didn't defend our box well enough today.”

Callum Lang looked bright for PNE during the first-half, but was forced off shortly before the break through injury.

North End’s boss provided an update on the forward’s situation, whilst admitting that his departure had changed the way his team attacked.


“Yes, it did,” admitted Hecky. “But we brought Jebbo, and he had good moments then.

“But then, when we were chasing, we put Jebbo more central and we kept trying to add attacking players on the pitch. But when we've given those goals away, it's difficult because Oxford have been working away, just setting up to defend their box, doing it really well.

“Once they're 3-1 up, we huffed, we puffed. We had balls flashing across, but we certainly didn't have the same desire and aggression in their box as they had in ours. Or flip that, they defended their box better than we defended ours.

“I saw that he obviously went down holding his ankle when he went off. So, we'll get that assessed.”

Oxford United boss Matt Bloomfield told BBC Radio Oxford:

"It's the best performance in my time here. Both in and out of possession there was lots to like, but I'm not going to get carried away about it, it's just one game.

"We've put two wins back-to-back for the first time in quite a while which we're really pleased about.

"A lot of the players were at a really good level which allowed us to have a team performance and we created multiple opportunities.

"I was actually disappointed at half-time that we left a couple of goals out there, but the second half the way they played the game in front of them, I thought the lads were excellent."